The Warmasters

Three masters of military science fiction present short novels from their three popular science fiction series, in a volume that includes David Weber's "Ms. Midshipwoman Harrington," "Choosing Sides by David Drake, and Eric Flint's "The Island."

This anthology contains three novellas of future or alternate war by three of the acknowledged experts in the field, so the title satisfies any reasonable truth-in-packaging requirements. The book should also satisfy most fans of the authors. David Weber's "Ms. Midshipwoman Harrington" confronts his best-known creation with the perils and opportunities of her "middy" cruise, which she survives with ah, honor and even distinction, in spite of the best efforts of enemies both foreign and domestic. Eric Flint's "Islands" reintroduces Calopodius, a Byzantine soldier blinded at 18 while commanding a desperate holding action in the Drake/Flint Belisarius alternate-history series. It also introduces his aristocratic wife, Anna, and by the time the two meet again, she's not the woman he married but a much improved and strengthened version. Finally, David Drake offers another story of the mercenary tankers, Hammer's Slammers, "Choosing Sides." Lt. Arne Huber has to choose whether he will work with the Slammers' chief executioner, Maj. Joachim Steuben, to avenge treachery and murder against his men and friends. Except Flint on occasion, none of the writers is doing anything that's not by now standard for good military SF. Nor are any of them really going to surprise any readers who might, for example, want to see Hammer's Slammers not being stabbed in the back by their civilian employers.

Three novellas set in the best-known worlds created by three leading military sf writers are the contents of this indicatively titled volume. David Weber's "Ms. Midshipwoman Harrington" takes his series protagonist on her middy cruise, complete with her treecat companion Nimitz, inept superiors, and a formidable opponent met in an action-filled climax. David Drake reintroduces us to Hammer's Slammers, and especially the psychopathic dirty-tricks officer, Major Joachim Steuben, as seen through the eyes of a company officer learning how dirty tricks sometimes need to be. Finally, Eric Flint takes Calopodius from his collaboration with Drake, the Belisarius series, and fleshes him out as a warrior who, blinded at 18, discovers unusual talents as a historian and finds the most unusual wife he marries out of convenience to be a formidable and loving woman. Fans of Honor Harrington, Hammer's Slammers, and Belisaurius won't find these tales unusual for either their authors or their series, but they will thoroughly enjoy them. Roland Green
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